While the idea of creating a centrally controlled admissions process for Jefferson Parish's advanced academies seems to enjoy widespread support, another suggestion to cut pre-kindergarten from the accelerated schools is running into friction.

Susan Poag/The Times-PicayuneThomas Jefferson High School student Breanna Bell teaches students how to use stretch bands to work their muscles during a visit by the LSU AgCenter and Blue Cross Blue Shield of Louisiana Smart Bodies program to Gretna No. 2 Academy for Advanced Studies in Gretna last month.

A group of educators, parents and community activists spent the last two months drafting a two-part plan to fix the problem-plagued application program for the specialized schools. Centralization to achieve more consistency is the theme of the first part. The second part argues for removing the earliest grades because such young students cannot be reliably tested to predict their success in school.

The Jefferson Parish School Board's academic affairs committee on Monday endorsed the first part but tabled the pre-kindergarten question for further study after board member Pat Tovrea voiced his opposition to it. That leaves pre-kindergarten in tact for 2011-12.

Only the application and testing procedures will likely move on to School Board consideration tonight, with leaders of parent and community advocacy groups saying they mostly applaud those changes. The board meets at 5 p.m. at Alfred Bonnabel Magnet Academy High School in Kenner.

"If we don't offer this pre-k program, we're going to lose these students to private and parochial schools," Tovrea said.

Tovrea said the admissions reform panel should gather more data on evaluating the youngest children for academy readiness.

A parent who attended Monday's meeting, Tasha Galan of Kenner, whose child could enter pre-kindergarten in the fall, said she also wants the earliest grades preserved in the academies. She argued the youngest children learn at a rapid pace, and creating a top-ranked school system requires offering them accelerated settings.

Deputy Superintendent Richard Carpenter said the major concern about pre-kindergarten centers on the fact that those students tend to advance to kindergarten automatically. That leaves few spaces for new 5-year-olds to enter the academies.

But children that young experience sharp developmental changes, so it's likely that some of the most qualified pre-kindergarteners would no longer rank the highest for kindergarten, but they'll still take up most of the seats.

One-on-one verbal testing of young students was a key trouble spot in an admissions program that has been embroiled in controversy over errors and dysfunction since September. Investigators who studied the problems said the individual testing format created an opening for exam administrators to intentionally or unintentionally apply their own subjective perceptions to children's answers.

Superintendent Diane Roussel said tests for high-achieving students generally don't become reliable until third grade, complicating matters. The schools could test students again in third grade, she said, but that also raises the possibility of disrupting children who come out of the testing no longer qualified for an advanced academy.

As it stands, the proposed admissions changes will replace face-to-face testing with paper-and-pencil testing in short sections for students in kindergarten and higher. Officials hope the practice promotes the overall goal of wringing as much subjectivity as possible out of the process. But they might have to resume oral testing for pre-kindergarten as they continue weighing where to place the youngest students.